O ensino de probabilidade com o uso do problema do jogo dos discos

Abstract

In this work, we present a didactic proposal which aim is to introduce Probability to students of Basic Education. This proposal consists in a sequence of classes that is based on the Game of Discs Problem, which goal is to determine the diameter that a disk must have so that when launched randomly on square tiles, has a certain probability of intercept their separating lines. This problem was put to students from three classes of third year of a state high school in a contextualized form and before introduction of Probability by the teacher. The idea was that the students should try to solve the problem in groups and with a minimal help from the teacher. Even with students having difficulties, it proved possible, and they solved the problem using a concrete experimentation of the game. For this, they approximated the probability of winning with a certain disc to the win percentage in the experimentation and, through graphical modeling, they achieved the desired answer. The motivation to this teaching propose was the observation by the author that the way that Probability has been traditionally teached has proven ineffective. Moreover, it can be saw that several Brazilian official documents, such as the National Curriculum Parameters (PCN) and Curricular Proposal of the State of São Paulo, as well as other researchers, suggest that concrete experimentation should be performed for a effective teaching of Probability. With the results obtained, presented in this dissertation, we conclude that our didactic proposal is efficient, bringing motivating classes and providing an environment in which students, besides learning Probability, could exercise their creative capacity.